23rd Edition - 10/6/06

• MLB Playoffs

Three close, well-pitched ball games yesterday. Quite surprising considering most of the pitchers involved were over 40-years-old.

Tigers 4, Yankees 3 (Series Tied 1-1)
Johnny Damon hit a three-run homer, but the Tigers chipped away.

Cardinals 2, Padres 0 (Cards lead 2-0)
Have the Cardinals forgotten they stunk down the stretch? What is their problem?

My Mets
Mets 4, Dodgers 1 (Mets lead 2-0)
Tom Glavine pitched six scoreless innings. Billy Wagner got his second save, and Jose Reyes drove in two RBI. The Mets are in control. At least half the teams I jumped on the bandwagon of, are doing fine (Twins being the other).
Yesterday's name of the game: Glavine, he might not have gone the 8 innings I promised, but he didn't give up a run and proved to be an oldie, but goodie.

My Twins
At 3:00 central it's the Twins vs. A's (A's lead 2-0). Radke vs. Haren. Either the Twins find a way to win and begin an amazing comeback, or the A's start getting dressed for the AL Championships.
The Name of the Game: Torii Hunter shakes off the diving catch, which led to an inside the park home run.

• The Picks

I'm back baby. I went a combined 5-1 last weekend. Before this, I had never had the chance to roll in money. Actually, it's not as cracked up as I thought it would be. Plus, I still can't find $20.
j NCAA: (Season 7-4-1)
Iowa -11 over Purdue
Pitt -7 over Syracuse
Nebraska -6.5 over Iowa State

j NFL: 2-1 (Season 8-3-1)
Titans +19 over Colts
Redskins +4.5 over Giants
Rams -3 over Packers

• The Movie

The Departed

Plot: Based on the Hong Kong film "Infernal Affairs," "The Departed" gets a South Boston makeover. The Massachusetts State Police are waging a war against crime lord Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson) from the inside. Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) goes undercover to try and gain Costello's trust, while Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) has worked his way up the Special Investigations Unit and is assigned to take down Costello's crew. What no one knows is that Sullivan grew up with Costello in South Boston.

Bottom Line: Hype. The big movies in 2006 have been surrounded by hype with very few payoffs. Superman was back and boring. Jack Sparrow took us on a pointless roller coaster ride, and no one bothered to see the all-star cast in "All the King's Men."

So, although I am a huge Martin Scorsese fan and Nicholson, DiCaprio, Damon, Mark Wahlberg and Alec Baldwin were involved, I didn't want to get too excited about "The Departed."

Well, go ahead, get excited. The story of good guys being bad, bad guys being good and the layers in between have this film immediately becoming a classic.

Whether it is a random at a bar getting a glass smashed in his face, a gun going off, or Costigan slowly losing his grip while undercover--every moment is intense. And beyond the intensity is a great touch of humor with everyone trying on their Boston accents and Baldwin coming away as the funny guy in the group. And of course, Nicholson shows off as the mob boss you don't mess with, plus bad hair and worse outfits.

The one knock on "The Departed" is that half the music is great. The other half ("Gimmie Shelter" from the Rolling Stones starts us off) feels like Scorsese just lifted songs from his previous films.

Hype, we finally have a movie in 2006 that has lived up to it.
Grade: A

22nd Edition - 10/5/06

• My Twins: Dead Twins Walking

A's 5, Twins 2 (A's lead 2-0)
I'm sure there are a million stats going against the Twins and for the A's, but the thing about a baseball game is, there really isn't a reason why one team can't win three in a row. It's unlikely, but baseball has a lot more ups and downs than any other sport. I haven't given up on the Twins yet, and the crowd was still in the game with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. Torii Hunter's misplayed dive, which led to an inside the park home run by Mark Kotsay will be the play everyone remembers, but just before that there was a double play that didn't get turned.
My name of the game yesterday: Morneau, 2-4 with a HR (I'm getting better at this)
The Twins play again on Friday, so it is highly unlikely that they will lose another game before then. Crafty verteran Brad Radke will be pitching on Friday.

• My Mets: Meet my Mets greet my Mets

Dodgers 5, Mets 6 (Mets lead 1-0)
Jeff Kent and J.D. Drew were both called out at home on the same play in the 2nd inning. That's the sort of thing that leads to a loss. The Mets beat the Dodgers 6-5, with Jeff Maine starting for the Mets and giving up 1 ER in 4 1/3 innings.

I even got to speak to a couple of Mets fan at the game yesterday. One of them missed the whole play, the other missed the second out because he was busy cheering from the first. I know the sample size is only two here, but that's a pretty poor showing from Mets fans.

If you want a running journal of the Mets - Dodgers game. Here is it, from ESPN's The Sports Guy.

My name of the game yesterday: Cliff Floyd, 1-3 with a HR (Yes, I'm brilliant)

They play again today with crafty veteran (all veterans are crafty) Tom Glavine going for the Mets.
My name of the game: Glavine, too much has been made about the Mets not having pitching, Glavine goes into the 8th today and the Mets get a second win.

• MLB Playoffs : The Others

The Yankees and Tigers were rained out. The play today, along with the Cardinals vs. Padres.

• NHL

It began. I think. Though I'm not totally sure.

• Stuff

Oh, what's this? A pedestal? All right, maybe I'll stand on it for a litte while... I think the number of times I have now fast-forwarded a DVD and expected the "jump back" feature from Tivo to kick in, is now up to double digits. So the question is, why don't DVD players adopt this feature? The two-second "jump back" is exactly what I want, especially when I am watching a bad movie such as "The Jacket" and I'm just waiting to see if Keira Knightley has a sex scene (the answer is yes). Now, I understand if you are watching "Usual Suspects" and you accidentally see Kevin Spacey lose his limp, but if you were fast-forwarding that part, you couldn't have cared that much anyway, and if I just destroyed "Usual Suspects" for you, fine go ahead and hate me, I already hated you ... Anyway, DVD player makers, give me the option at least of turning on the "jump back." That is all.

21st Edition - 10/4/06

• Last Wednesday I decided every Wednesday would be "The Wednesday Fluff," focusing on life outside of sports. Well, I'm not sticking to my guns already. Fluff will happen when and where it can. No day can officially be fluff when ...

• My Twins (Hurting)

A's 3, Twins 2 (A's lead series 1-0)
Barry Zito (a free agent after this season who would look great in a Cubs uniform) outpitched Johan Santana mainly because of Frank Thomas. A year ago Thomas was washed up, and the Sox happily dumped him, now he is a Hall of Famers who might lead his team to the promised land. Don't you love when sports analogies get religious? Punto was my name of the game (new phrase I am trying out that means pick to click). He went 0-3.
And now Bonser (a rookie) is pitching against Loaiza (another ex-White Sox) today at noon.
Name of the Game: Morneau, time for him to show the season stats weren't a fluke.

• My Mets (Hurting even more)

No Pedro, and now El Duque (Orlando Hernandez) felt discomfort in his leg during a jog, but at this stage, he's going to pitch. The pitching staff just doesn't look good, but the great thing about baseball is that the Mets could put up 8 runs a game and it just wouldn't matter who pitches. The Mets play at 3:00 central this afternoon.
Name of the Game: Cliff Floyd, he's hurting with a sore Achilles, but it won't matter when he hits a home run.

• MLB (The others)

Cardinals 5, Padres 1 (Cards lead 1-0): Pujols homers, Carpenter pitches a gem and the Cards forget they have sucked recently.
Yankees 8, Tigers 4 (Yanks lead 1-0): Jeter, Abreu and Giambi all have great days.

• My Cubs (My real team)

Dusty Baker is gone. Joe Girardi is available. I am nervous. It makes too much sense. And the Cubs aren't good at making sense. Before Baker the Cubs never had a real manager (except for Don Zimmer) in my life. Though after being at Wrigley with my girlfriend (now fiancee) for Game 6 of the 2003 NL Championships, I realized Baker is not a good in-game manager. He lost control of his ball club after the Bartman thing, and putting in Farnsworth instead of a rested Zambrano, or a change of pace lefty (Prior had started) are still decisions that bug the hell out of me today.

• NFL (But, really let's just talk about the Bears)

There is a new number one NFL team in the power rankings on ESPN. Click here to read. The short version is, everyone is starting to realize the Bears are good.

• Stuff

Did anyone bother watching "Friday Night Lights?" I have it on Tivo, haven't watched yet.

Also - I was talking to friends about the best movies of the year for me. Here's the list.

The quick list (in no order)
Little Miss Sunshine
The Heart of the Game
Mission Impossible 3
Thank you for Smoking
Beerfest
The Inside Man
Jackass Number Two
Brick

It's a short list, and it's not official. Am I forgetting anything?

20th Edition - 10/3/06

• Fantasy (Everybody's doing it)

I hesitate to talk about Fantasy Sports. Supposedly it is the biggest crime of the new century. But last night, in my league, "Shane Falco" led "Bo Knows" 110-109.58 (both had more points than anyone else in our league). Falco is in Italy for 10 days with his wife, but still managing his team. He started Brett Favre, interceptions get negative points, QB yards aren't worth much ... final score Falco (108.2) - Bo Knows (109.58). Hurts.

• Steriods (Everybody's probably doing this too)

A federal prosecutor said there were "significant inacurracies" in the report the Los Angeles Times made, sighting Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, Miguel Tejada and others to steriod use. So who knows what that means at this point. Here's the thing, WE'LL NEVER KNOW. We won't know officially who did steriods, HGH or anything else. I don't know if the public would even care unless Bonds was going after the all-time home run record. Take that away coupled with the fact that most reporters hates Bonds because he hates them, and it doesn't become front page.

IF baseball didn't have the home run race between McQwire and Sosa, it would have taken a lot longer for baseball to come back. IF someone (reporter, commissioner, manager, player, fans) would have demanded a steriod investigation back then, this wouldn't be a problem. NO ONE wanted to stop the home runs.

We need to move on, the only way that happens is to decide it was the Steriod Era, allow all the stats, and cheer like hell that someone like Pujols or Howard destroy all home run records.

I'm sick of players making comments such as, "I have never tested positive." Then reporters decide that means he found a way to pass all his tests.

• NFL (Hopefully not everybody is going to do this)

Albert Haynesworth is suspended for five games. Click here for the full story and video. He stomped on the head of Andre Groude, who's helmet had already been knocked off. Five games is a ton, and he deserved it. Keep in mind, for something that happened on the field, this is the longest suspension EVER. The pervious long was when a Green Bay Packer threw Jim McMahon to the ground in 1986. He got two games.

• My Twins (moving on to happy thoughts)

Home field advantage and at least two pitching performances by Johan Santana. That should be enough to get past the A's. I don't care for the best-of-five series, it doesn't give an accuarate test of who's the best team ... But in this case, I'll take it.

By the way, it's the afternoon game, so fire up the espn.com at 12:09 central, and enjoy the rest of your work day.

Player of the Game (Besides Santana): Punto.

• My Mets (a little nervous, we'll talk tomorrow)

• Stuff (Saturday Night Live)

I forgot to talk about SNL on Monday (a new weekly feature, since I am the only one who watches it religiously). Dane Cook isn't all that funny. He's lost something for me. Brian Williams had a nice cameo during the news, but Seth Myers looked nervous and talked WAY too fast during his first time doing "Weekend Update" with Amy Poehler. "Weekend Update" also has a new set, which looks like my elementary school's wallpaper, high class all the way.
Funny SNL's for 2006/07: 0-1 (Dane Cook)

18th Edition - 9/29/06

• TO (Terrell Owens)

Oops. That's what the police are saying. "Accidental overdose" is the official classification and the case is now closed (by the police).
Here is the link to the 911 transcript.
I'm done with this story.

• My Mets

There's trouble. Right here in New York City. And is starts with T and that rhymes with P and that stands for Pedro. Oh, we've got trouble. My beloved Mets just announced Pedro Martinez will not pitch in the postseason. A torn tendon in his left calf muscle has the Mets without their No. 1. Two days ago I would have said the Mets are done. But not now, now I believe this simply adds to the drama of a World Series run, with Pedro as the ultimate cheerleader.

• My Twins

Torii Hunter was on PTI yesterday.
"I'm a competitor, you make a mistake on one pitch, I GOTCHA."
I love my Twins. Plus they tied the Tigers for the central division lead (loser getting the wildcard). Though I would rather have the Twins as the wildcard (underdog, plus wildcard has had alot of success getting to the World Series lately).

• College Football (The Biggest Game EVER, of ALL-TIME)

Well, here we are ... a day, some hours and lots of minutes away from the Iowa Hawkeyes inviting THE Ohio State Buckeyes to dance Saturday night at Kinnick Stadium. I won't be watching live. A wedding of good friends needs to be attended. Latest word is they will not put a TV in the bar, which everyone agrees is a good call.

This is the biggest game in Kinnick history (in my 30-year-old lifetime). IF (a BIG if) we win, there will be nothing bigger. I think my strategy will be this ... About every 10-15 minutes, I will make a phone call to one of two friends and alums. I will live through them. Then, when I get home from the wedding, I will watch the game immediately if we won, Sunday morning if we lose.

I'm assuming there are some other football games going on this weekend. Feel free to leave comments about them.

• THE PICKS

All Big Ten for me this weekend.
College Season: 4-4-1
*Ohio St (-7) over Iowa (it's a reverse jinx, and it's a good line after watching all of Iowa's games this year - this does not make me a traitor, just realistic)
*Michigan (-9.5) over Minnesota
*Wisconsin (-11) over Indiana

NFL Season: 6-2-1
*Bears (-3.5) over the Seahawks (I got my bet in on Monday at -2.5)
*Vikings (+1) over the Bills
*Browns (-2.5) over the Raiders

• Stuff (Just one movie review)

"School for Scoundrels" - The first half starts off strong, almost like a comedic "Fight Club." They even borrow the "pick a fight with someone" idea. In fact, a lot of the film feels borrowed. But the second half of the film goes downhill fast. As soon as Roger (Jon Heder) starts competing with Dr. P (Billly Bob Thornton) it's just not funny. Heder as a leading man just doesn't cut it and Thornton looks like he is wearing too much make-up. To top if off, Ben Stiller's cameo and accent don't generate one laugh. I hate when I movie starts out good and then tails off, the reverse of that ALWAYS leads to a better review. C+

By the way, I tivo'd "The Office" last night and for some reason, the first five minutes didn't record. No reason I can think of, anybody else have this problem?

17th Edition - 9/28/07

• The Bandwagon (REVEALED)

After some good thinking, real good thinking, I have decided to jump onto two bandwagon's, but with different weight.
My first (and lesser) bandwagon is the
New York Mets because:
*I had two requests to be a Mets fan
*I am still a sucker for Pedro as a mild Red Sox fan for the past ten years
*David Wright and Carlos Beltran normally set-up in big moments
*It's always better if the Mets win more than the Yankees
*They have a crafty verteran: Jose Valentin - age 37
*They have an ex-Cub: Steve Trachsel
*Plus I hate when a team is TOO GOOD and then somehow forgets how to win. Which might happen to the Mets, so I hope my cheering for them will turn that around.

But my real team, my new favortie all of time (for a couple of weeks):
Minnesota Twins because:
*Small market teams should have a chance
*Joe Mauer could have been a Cub (instead of Mark Prior)
*I went to my first Twins game this year, and they beat the Cubs
*Justin Morneau was on one of my fantasy baseball teams (I had two)
*Rondell White and Phil Nevin were Cubs and everybody knows the more ex-Cubs you have on your team the more likely you are to win
*Johan Santana is so fun to watch right now. He's been in a groove for four months.

So - IF one of the teams is eliminated, all my attention goes to the other.
AND - IF both make it to the World Series, I cheer for the Twins and spit on the Mets (but secretly just wish for seven games of good baseball).

• TO (Terrell Owens)

He reportedly attempted suicide. Then he reportedly didn't attempt suicide. Owens says he was groggy and incoherent when police arrived at his house because of an allergic reaction to painkillers and vitamin supplements. Police arrived because Owens' publicist Kim Etheredge (not many players have publicists) called. Though she doesn't know why the police report said he told authorities he was depressed. Owens doesn't remember anything.

Clearly, either portions of the police report or Owen's statement are misleading. Sure, more will come out on the subject, but we'll never know.

The worst statement came from Etheredge who said, "Terrell has 25 million reasons why he should be alive." That was a reference to the 3-year contract he signed with the Cowboys.

What I find most worrisome is the amount of sports commentators who are saying things like, "When I saw the report, I didn't believe it for a second."

WE don't know Terrell Owens. WE only think we do. I have no clue what actually happened. But, depression can easily be disguised. It is POSSIBLE that Owens, or any professional athlete can be depressed. But the outcome of it is uncomfortable for the public. Fans want to admire, and depression is WAY too confusing to wrap your head around. Especially compared to how this might affect your fantasy football team.

On a side note ... There will be tons of continuing coverage, things will be leaked, 911 tapes will be made available ... and this is all because we WANT to know. This is not information that will help the human race, send a guilty person to jail or protect society ... it's entertainment.

• Baseball (And down the stretch they come)

The Cardinals finally won a game ... and the Astros were losing 6-1. But somehow, someway they came back and beat the Pirates in 15 innings, 7-6. Here's hoping a one-game playoff decides it. Currently the Cards maintain their 1.5 game lead.

• NFL

Quick News
* Odell Thurman of the Bengals is done for the season. Six Bengals have faced charges since December (twice as many wins, but infinite compared to the losses: 3-0). The team finally said enough is enough after Thurman's DUI.
* Shaun Alexander will not play. He had said he was feeling better, but a second x-ray revealed the same bone chip in his foot. This means I still look very smart getting an early bet on the Bears -2.5 this Sunday night vs. the Seahawks.

• Coming Soon (Tomorrow)

As always, the mildly confident picks are coming. Plus a quick review of "School for Scoundrels."